I would have no problem at all paying up to $50 a month for a good, and I mean good MMO. What makes a good MMO, well it depends on the person. That said, theres games that are P2P that are worth a sub, and I have no problem paying them.
There's no doubt that P2P has a place in the market. But that place has to be earned by producing a quality product.
Any developer that can launch a quality MMO with compelling game play can charge a sub fee, and players will queue up to hand over their wallets. The "easiest" way to achieve that goal will probably be to focus on a certain niche and give them exactly what they want.
However, any new MMO that doesn't have that elusive something that draws (and holds) the punters will soon be joining the multitudes of F2P games and trying to develop "clever" ways of getting players to spend money in the Cash Shop.
Most made-for-F2P games that have launched so far are junk, with a few rising to "acceptable" status. There are AAA games that are F2P, but they all launched with box sales and had at least a year of subs before taking refuge in the freemium market.
The first made-for-F2P MMORPG that may actually be very good is EQ:Next. However, I expect that it will have a very strong "freemium" model. Paying a sub in EQ:Next will most likely give you some significant perks. How SOE are going to earn back their development cost will be an interesting process to watch...
And it doesn't change the fact that most of those games are crap,
Crap for you, fun for many players. And also make money for devs.
I don't think your personal opinion matters to the success of these games.
My opinion has the same worth as yours, since you admit to not paying anything yourself, you're not making them any money either. I fully support the games I play, and they're still alive and making money off a sub and still adding content.
I am not sure it can, but that does not mean it will not one day thrive again. We have had had only two P2P/B2P releases so far this year and we are now in August, that does not bode well.
It is possible that the big funding money that was the prerogative of P2P will start to include big name F2P MMO's. But I doubt that's going to happen, certainly not in a sustained way, though maybe for one or two titles. So we are going to end up with MMO's that are poorly funded compared to their predecessors. This will be detrimental to the genre.
We have had discussions on here before how the P2P financial model creates a MMO that is more interested in long term content than the F2P model. It is not that I think F2P cannot do new content, it is just that P2P does it better.
Some MMO's can eschew the problems with the F2P model. PS did that, by making the focus of the game PvP you do not need new zones, quests and so on. But that game is a MMOFPS, MMO's are too content dependant to thrive as well under F2P as they do P2P. Yes I know some P2P MMO's have disappeared, I would put that down to the greater running costs of a P2P MMO, in contrast all you need to do in F2P is update the cash shop.
End of the day it is what sells, to financiers, gaming producers and players. F2P is low risk as it is cheaper, that has sold well to those funding and making MMO's over the last few years. It is not selling well to players who leave so quickly for their next fix elsewhere.
Nearly all MMO's are now moving to a hybrid payment system anyway, we are still using the terms F2P and P2P like we did five years ago. But F2P now includes a subscription and P2P now includes a cash shop. So really it is more about how much we will see the P2P element in MMOs which will all have hybrid revenue models.
And it doesn't change the fact that most of those games are crap,
Crap for you, fun for many players. And also make money for devs.
I don't think your personal opinion matters to the success of these games.
Yeah, successful at stealing stupid people's money. Many F2P games are not only bad, but shameless money grabs. Not much better than slot machines. So I kinda agree: successful virtual slot machines, but absolutely crappy games.
"EVE is likely the best MMORPG that you've never really understood or played" - Kyleran
And it doesn't change the fact that most of those games are crap,
Crap for you, fun for many players. And also make money for devs.
I don't think your personal opinion matters to the success of these games.
Yeah, successful at stealing stupid people's money. Many F2P games are not only bad, but shameless money grabs. Not much better than slot machines. So I kinda agree: successful virtual slot machines, but absolutely crappy games.
Exactly, I don't see why more people don't understand this. Developers do not want to design these games from the ground up around a F2P model (exception to EQN afaik). If they could churn out something meaningful and engaging to a player, they will want that guaranteed money from their players every month so they can pay their staff and continue to churn out something meaningful and engaging.
P2P is the most reliable business model for a developer in terms of monthly budget projection, it will die when there are no longer games worth playing for an extended period of time. I assure you developers prefer P2P and will aspire to maintain such a prestigious business model, held only by the most exceptional of games.
And it doesn't change the fact that most of those games are crap,
Crap for you, fun for many players. And also make money for devs.
I don't think your personal opinion matters to the success of these games.
Yeah, successful at stealing stupid people's money. Many F2P games are not only bad, but shameless money grabs. Not much better than slot machines. So I kinda agree: successful virtual slot machines, but absolutely crappy games.
How is f2p game "stealing" my money when so far, i only have fun and pay nothing?
You probably need to understand the word "steal" better.
Of course they can survive and the only people saying they can't are those who want every game to be free so they can freeload or people who want to spend lots of money to gain immediate advantages over others.
The question is can it be as profitable?
I think yes but it takes more work and attention to detail.
F2P games don't care about long term retention they profit from short term spending sprees and large population turnover.
P2P needs to hold an audience for protracted periods and the turnover tends to decrease over time because of the initial monetary barrier to entry.No P2P game has managed to come up with a end game and content release model that can achieve that in the last half decade or so.
P2P is the most reliable business model for a developer in terms of monthly budget projection, it will die when there are no longer games worth playing for an extended period of time. I assure you developers prefer P2P and will aspire to maintain such a prestigious business model, held only by the most exceptional of games.
And yet F2P makes more money, and the whole industry is moving in that direction.
I'll never play F2P. I've played them in the past and they all seem to be sub-par. F2P brings about many problems, namely the community. The community in F2P seems to be a lot more immature. I don't know if they're just younger, or it's the fact that they have no monetary investment in the game, but people just act like they don't care about the game. P2P players seem to at least care what happens to their game.
And it doesn't change the fact that most of those games are crap,
Crap for you, fun for many players. And also make money for devs.
I don't think your personal opinion matters to the success of these games.
Yeah, successful at stealing stupid people's money. Many F2P games are not only bad, but shameless money grabs. Not much better than slot machines. So I kinda agree: successful virtual slot machines, but absolutely crappy games.
How is f2p game "stealing" my money when so far, i only have fun and pay nothing?
You probably need to understand the word "steal" better.
And you should probably realise that the world isn't spining around you. I didn't say they are stealing YOUR money. Actually, I didn't literaly mean they steal people's money. But ofc you know all that and you are just trolling, so I'll leave it here. Have a free to play day.
"EVE is likely the best MMORPG that you've never really understood or played" - Kyleran
P2P is the most reliable business model for a developer in terms of monthly budget projection, it will die when there are no longer games worth playing for an extended period of time. I assure you developers prefer P2P and will aspire to maintain such a prestigious business model, held only by the most exceptional of games.
And yet F2P makes more money, and the whole industry is moving in that direction.
"F2P makes more money" ?
More money than what ? A MMO that has failed to keep it's monthly subscribers ?
If "F2P makes more money", then obviously NCSoft didn't get the memo, because Wildstar will be launching as sub-based. So NCSoft don't know what the latest "trend" is in the MMO market ? Who knew ?
The user and all related content has been deleted.
Somebody, somewhere has better skills as you have, more experience as you have, is smarter than you, has more friends as you do and can stay online longer. Just pray he's not out to get you.
Woah lots of good discussion here . Alot of you are bringing the point of $15/month being not alot of money for entertainment and I would agree if you didnt have games like GW2 producing content on a bi weekly basis for free! Why should I pay a monthly fee to a dev who wont provide me with even the same content delivery schedule as a B2P game? I think moving forward devs will have a hard time justifying that monthly fee as we have had games be successful without the need for it. My hope would be that devs will adopt a more hybrid business plan where a large range of people can get their hands on the game the way they want, while still having a niche community for the few great p2p games out there!
P2P is the most reliable business model for a developer in terms of monthly budget projection, it will die when there are no longer games worth playing for an extended period of time. I assure you developers prefer P2P and will aspire to maintain such a prestigious business model, held only by the most exceptional of games.
And yet F2P makes more money, and the whole industry is moving in that direction.
Are you refering to all of the F2P games combined vs all the P2P games combined? lol
To that I would say to you that there are obviously far more F2P games right now than there are P2P worth a cent. You're saying there is a single F2P MMO that makes more per month than WoW?!
The industry is moving in that direction because the games they are making have no longevity, they have to get what they can out of their players in the first 3 months.
P2P is the most reliable business model for a developer in terms of monthly budget projection, it will die when there are no longer games worth playing for an extended period of time. I assure you developers prefer P2P and will aspire to maintain such a prestigious business model, held only by the most exceptional of games.
And yet F2P makes more money, and the whole industry is moving in that direction.
Do you have a link to the article supporting this statement, or even a simple graph to break it down for me? Most of these things come down to perspective and what angle you show the data from so I would be interested to see where this came from. F2P may look better at first since it shows large amounts of money in short time frames but compare it to WoW for instance over the past decade and the numbers show a completely different story.
P2P is the most reliable business model for a developer in terms of monthly budget projection, it will die when there are no longer games worth playing for an extended period of time. I assure you developers prefer P2P and will aspire to maintain such a prestigious business model, held only by the most exceptional of games.
And yet F2P makes more money, and the whole industry is moving in that direction.
Do you have a link to the article supporting this statement, or even a simple graph to break it down for me? Most of these things come down to perspective and what angle you show the data from so I would be interested to see where this came from. F2P may look better at first since it shows large amounts of money in short time frames but compare it to WoW for instance over the past decade and the numbers show a completely different story.
Of course. In fact, MULTIPLE articles with many data points.
"The last five years have seen a significant upset to the model of subscription games, with audiences of P2P MMO titles remaining steady or declining, while the number of F2P game users has exploded. If you were to look at the growth of the audience alone, the market for F2P games is substantially larger than that for pay-to-play. Six times larger, in fact."
“Recovering from last month’s audience decline, free-to-play MMOs counted an additional 3 million players in March. At the same time monetization saw a slight improvement, causing overall revenues to grow to $195 million.”
“The pay-to-play MMO segment contracted and lost an estimated 289,000 subscribers in March. Overall revenues, however, remained relatively stable at $86 million.”
Originally posted by Gwendal Woah lots of good discussion here . Alot of you are bringing the point of $15/month being not alot of money for entertainment and I would agree if you didnt have games like GW2 producing content on a bi weekly basis for free! Why should I pay a monthly fee to a dev who wont provide me with even the same content delivery schedule as a B2P game? I think moving forward devs will have a hard time justifying that monthly fee as we have had games be successful without the need for it. My hope would be that devs will adopt a more hybrid business plan where a large range of people can get their hands on the game the way they want, while still having a niche community for the few great p2p games out there!
Hmm. Hard to put this the right way, but I don't pay 15 bucks a month for the content updates. Its not about filtering out the freeloaders either. Its more about knowing that everyone you play with has made the same financial commitment as you. Its an intangible tone that sets up the community in a different way than f2p and b2p cash shop games. I like the way p2p communities feel. Not saying b2p and f2p ones are crap. They are just not what I look for in an mmorpg.
P2P is the most reliable business model for a developer in terms of monthly budget projection, it will die when there are no longer games worth playing for an extended period of time. I assure you developers prefer P2P and will aspire to maintain such a prestigious business model, held only by the most exceptional of games.
And yet F2P makes more money, and the whole industry is moving in that direction.
Do you have a link to the article supporting this statement, or even a simple graph to break it down for me? Most of these things come down to perspective and what angle you show the data from so I would be interested to see where this came from. F2P may look better at first since it shows large amounts of money in short time frames but compare it to WoW for instance over the past decade and the numbers show a completely different story.
He's refering to the chart that appeared here and the article that started the F2P market had exceeded the P2P market. That chart / article included subscription fees from games that had labeled themselves F2P (freemium models) as well as MOBA games. I'm sure he'll post it as it pops up in almost every F2P vs P2P thread, if you don't want to wait searching through topics related to nari will reveal it in short order.
Edit : too late (wasn't there another Superdata article? It seems to be missing - the one referring to revenue across the 2 pay models)
P2P is the most reliable business model for a developer in terms of monthly budget projection, it will die when there are no longer games worth playing for an extended period of time. I assure you developers prefer P2P and will aspire to maintain such a prestigious business model, held only by the most exceptional of games.
And yet F2P makes more money, and the whole industry is moving in that direction.
Do you have a link to the article supporting this statement, or even a simple graph to break it down for me? Most of these things come down to perspective and what angle you show the data from so I would be interested to see where this came from. F2P may look better at first since it shows large amounts of money in short time frames but compare it to WoW for instance over the past decade and the numbers show a completely different story.
Of course. In fact, MULTIPLE articles with many data points.
"The last five years have seen a significant upset to the model of subscription games, with audiences of P2P MMO titles remaining steady or declining, while the number of F2P game users has exploded. If you were to look at the growth of the audience alone, the market for F2P games is substantially larger than that for pay-to-play. Six times larger, in fact."
“Recovering from last month’s audience decline, free-to-play MMOs counted an additional 3 million players in March. At the same time monetization saw a slight improvement, causing overall revenues to grow to $195 million.”
“The pay-to-play MMO segment contracted and lost an estimated 289,000 subscribers in March. Overall revenues, however, remained relatively stable at $86 million.”
Originally posted by Gwendal $15/month not alot of money for entertainment and I would agree if you didnt have games like GW2 producing content on a bi weekly basis for free!
Why should I pay a monthly fee to a dev who wont provide me with even the same content delivery schedule as a B2P game?
depends on the game too - not everyone will enjoy GW2 game style
Originally posted by Gwendal Woah lots of good discussion here . Alot of you are bringing the point of $15/month being not alot of money for entertainment and I would agree if you didnt have games like GW2 producing content on a bi weekly basis for free! Why should I pay a monthly fee to a dev who wont provide me with even the same content delivery schedule as a B2P game? I think moving forward devs will have a hard time justifying that monthly fee as we have had games be successful without the need for it. My hope would be that devs will adopt a more hybrid business plan where a large range of people can get their hands on the game the way they want, while still having a niche community for the few great p2p games out there!
Hmm. Hard to put this the right way, but I don't pay 15 bucks a month for the content updates. Its not about filtering out the freeloaders either. Its more about knowing that everyone you play with has made the same financial commitment as you. Its an intangible tone that sets up the community in a different way than f2p and b2p cash shop games. I like the way p2p communities feel. Not saying b2p and f2p ones are crap. They are just not what I look for in an mmorpg.
I agree with you on this point 100% Foomerang, only pay to play games I've ever come across with really bad communities were wow since parents use it as a baby sitter, and aion, I think aion was because of the imbalanced overworld pvp. All the other MMO's I've played had stellar communities with people who for the most part enjoyed the game and supported it.
Originally posted by Gwendal $15/month not alot of money for entertainment and I would agree if you didnt have games like GW2 producing content on a bi weekly basis for free!
Why should I pay a monthly fee to a dev who wont provide me with even the same content delivery schedule as a B2P game?
depends on the game too - not everyone will enjoy GW2 game style
I'm ok with both B2P and sub models
Same here, B2P gets the funding in and if you release paid for expansions it is very similar to P2P.
Comments
There's no doubt that P2P has a place in the market. But that place has to be earned by producing a quality product.
Any developer that can launch a quality MMO with compelling game play can charge a sub fee, and players will queue up to hand over their wallets. The "easiest" way to achieve that goal will probably be to focus on a certain niche and give them exactly what they want.
However, any new MMO that doesn't have that elusive something that draws (and holds) the punters will soon be joining the multitudes of F2P games and trying to develop "clever" ways of getting players to spend money in the Cash Shop.
Most made-for-F2P games that have launched so far are junk, with a few rising to "acceptable" status. There are AAA games that are F2P, but they all launched with box sales and had at least a year of subs before taking refuge in the freemium market.
The first made-for-F2P MMORPG that may actually be very good is EQ:Next. However, I expect that it will have a very strong "freemium" model. Paying a sub in EQ:Next will most likely give you some significant perks. How SOE are going to earn back their development cost will be an interesting process to watch...
My opinion has the same worth as yours, since you admit to not paying anything yourself, you're not making them any money either. I fully support the games I play, and they're still alive and making money off a sub and still adding content.
I am not sure it can, but that does not mean it will not one day thrive again. We have had had only two P2P/B2P releases so far this year and we are now in August, that does not bode well.
It is possible that the big funding money that was the prerogative of P2P will start to include big name F2P MMO's. But I doubt that's going to happen, certainly not in a sustained way, though maybe for one or two titles. So we are going to end up with MMO's that are poorly funded compared to their predecessors. This will be detrimental to the genre.
We have had discussions on here before how the P2P financial model creates a MMO that is more interested in long term content than the F2P model. It is not that I think F2P cannot do new content, it is just that P2P does it better.
Some MMO's can eschew the problems with the F2P model. PS did that, by making the focus of the game PvP you do not need new zones, quests and so on. But that game is a MMOFPS, MMO's are too content dependant to thrive as well under F2P as they do P2P. Yes I know some P2P MMO's have disappeared, I would put that down to the greater running costs of a P2P MMO, in contrast all you need to do in F2P is update the cash shop.
End of the day it is what sells, to financiers, gaming producers and players. F2P is low risk as it is cheaper, that has sold well to those funding and making MMO's over the last few years. It is not selling well to players who leave so quickly for their next fix elsewhere.
Nearly all MMO's are now moving to a hybrid payment system anyway, we are still using the terms F2P and P2P like we did five years ago. But F2P now includes a subscription and P2P now includes a cash shop. So really it is more about how much we will see the P2P element in MMOs which will all have hybrid revenue models.
Yeah, successful at stealing stupid people's money. Many F2P games are not only bad, but shameless money grabs. Not much better than slot machines. So I kinda agree: successful virtual slot machines, but absolutely crappy games.
"EVE is likely the best MMORPG that you've never really understood or played" - Kyleran
Exactly, I don't see why more people don't understand this. Developers do not want to design these games from the ground up around a F2P model (exception to EQN afaik). If they could churn out something meaningful and engaging to a player, they will want that guaranteed money from their players every month so they can pay their staff and continue to churn out something meaningful and engaging.
P2P is the most reliable business model for a developer in terms of monthly budget projection, it will die when there are no longer games worth playing for an extended period of time. I assure you developers prefer P2P and will aspire to maintain such a prestigious business model, held only by the most exceptional of games.
How is f2p game "stealing" my money when so far, i only have fun and pay nothing?
You probably need to understand the word "steal" better.
Of course they can survive and the only people saying they can't are those who want every game to be free so they can freeload or people who want to spend lots of money to gain immediate advantages over others.
The question is can it be as profitable?
I think yes but it takes more work and attention to detail.
F2P games don't care about long term retention they profit from short term spending sprees and large population turnover.
P2P needs to hold an audience for protracted periods and the turnover tends to decrease over time because of the initial monetary barrier to entry.No P2P game has managed to come up with a end game and content release model that can achieve that in the last half decade or so.
And yet F2P makes more money, and the whole industry is moving in that direction.
P2P will survive just fine.
And you should probably realise that the world isn't spining around you. I didn't say they are stealing YOUR money. Actually, I didn't literaly mean they steal people's money. But ofc you know all that and you are just trolling, so I'll leave it here. Have a free to play day.
"EVE is likely the best MMORPG that you've never really understood or played" - Kyleran
"F2P makes more money" ?
More money than what ? A MMO that has failed to keep it's monthly subscribers ?
If "F2P makes more money", then obviously NCSoft didn't get the memo, because Wildstar will be launching as sub-based. So NCSoft don't know what the latest "trend" is in the MMO market ? Who knew ?
Somebody, somewhere has better skills as you have, more experience as you have, is smarter than you, has more friends as you do and can stay online longer. Just pray he's not out to get you.
Are you refering to all of the F2P games combined vs all the P2P games combined? lol
To that I would say to you that there are obviously far more F2P games right now than there are P2P worth a cent. You're saying there is a single F2P MMO that makes more per month than WoW?!
The industry is moving in that direction because the games they are making have no longevity, they have to get what they can out of their players in the first 3 months.
Do you have a link to the article supporting this statement, or even a simple graph to break it down for me? Most of these things come down to perspective and what angle you show the data from so I would be interested to see where this came from. F2P may look better at first since it shows large amounts of money in short time frames but compare it to WoW for instance over the past decade and the numbers show a completely different story.
Of course. In fact, MULTIPLE articles with many data points.
http://www.superdataresearch.com/blog/us-free-to-play-does-it-pay-to-switch/
"The last five years have seen a significant upset to the model of subscription games, with audiences of P2P MMO titles remaining steady or declining, while the number of F2P game users has exploded. If you were to look at the growth of the audience alone, the market for F2P games is substantially larger than that for pay-to-play. Six times larger, in fact."
http://www.business2community.com/tech-gadgets/digital-game-sales-for-march-2013-0475928
http://www.newzoo.com/trend-reports/mmo-trend-report/
"Free-to-play MMO games take 47% of all money spent on MMO games in the US, up from 39% in 2010"
He's refering to the chart that appeared here and the article that started the F2P market had exceeded the P2P market. That chart / article included subscription fees from games that had labeled themselves F2P (freemium models) as well as MOBA games. I'm sure he'll post it as it pops up in almost every F2P vs P2P thread, if you don't want to wait searching through topics related to nari will reveal it in short order.
Edit : too late
(wasn't there another Superdata article? It seems to be missing - the one referring to revenue across the 2 pay models)
Ah, so 250+ F2P games earned as much as 5 sub-only MMO's ?
LMAO
No wonder AAA MMO's are still trying to launch as sub-based games...
depends on the game too - not everyone will enjoy GW2 game style
I'm ok with both B2P and sub models
EQ2 fan sites
I agree with you on this point 100% Foomerang, only pay to play games I've ever come across with really bad communities were wow since parents use it as a baby sitter, and aion, I think aion was because of the imbalanced overworld pvp. All the other MMO's I've played had stellar communities with people who for the most part enjoyed the game and supported it.
Same here, B2P gets the funding in and if you release paid for expansions it is very similar to P2P.